Welcome, fellow talent development professionals and learning leaders. In this edition of Upward Bound, you’ll find an overview of an adult learning theory, a tool for managing your personal learning library, and a reflection on experimental problem solving.
Let's dive in!
Heutagogy: Andragogy 2.0?
Heutagogy (pronounced h’w-YOO-tah-go-gee)* is an approach to self-determined learning that leverages the power of new technologies to put learners firmly in the driver’s seat.
According to a 2012 research review titled Heutagogy and Lifelong Learning: A Review of Heutagogical Practice and Self-Determined Learning, the theory builds upon Malcolm Knowles’ contributions to andragogy and its core assumptions about adult learners.
However, heutagogy differs from andragogy in key ways:
While andragogy focuses on self-directed learning, heutagogy focuses on self-determined learning. What’s the difference? In an andragogical approach, the instructor creates the learning objectives and curriculum with the learner’s input. In a heutagogical approach, the learner determines what they learn, how they learn it, and how they will evaluate their own progress. The instructor provides guidance and resources, but the learner ultimately owns the learning experience.
Andragogy focuses on building learners’ competence, or their ability to acquire relevant knowledge and skills for a particular context. In addition to building competence, heutagogy focuses on building capability, or the ability to flexibly apply knowledge and skills in new contexts.
Heutagogy challenges learners to reflect on their personal values and beliefs within the context of a learning experience. In addition to reflecting on their approach to a problem and its results, they also reflect on how the problem-solving process changed their beliefs and behaviors. This is called double-loop learning.
Andragogy is primarily focused on content (what to learn), while heutagogy is primarily concerned with process (how to learn).
The research review argues that heutagogy is a natural extension of andragogy – an andragogy 2.0, if you will.
Practical Application
Heutagogy is a useful framework for designing learning experiences for highly motivated learners with well-developed self-management skills and solid background knowledge. It lends itself well to coaching advanced practitioners. I don’t think it would be as effective with novice learners.
Learn More
If you’re new to this theory (like I am), I recommend reading Heutagogy and Lifelong Learning, published in the January 2012 edition of The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning.
*If you have trouble pronouncing heutagogy, you’re not alone. This YouTube video from Schoology demonstrates the correct pronunciation (along with all the hilarious ways you can mispronounce it).
Tool Showcase
Trello
Trello is a web-based platform based on the Kanban board, an agile project management tool designed to make work visible at all stages of the workflow.
Recently, I’ve been using Trello as a professional learning library. When I find a useful article, video, or research paper, I copy the link and paste it into a Trello card. I organize my cards by topics like learning theory, accessibility, and AI.
This strategy not only makes it easy to find resources quickly; it also visually represents my “T,” or the balance between the breadth and depth of my professional knowledge. (Props to my colleague Christy Tucker for popularizing this concept.)
When I zoom out and see my entire board at once, I can immediately spot trends in my professional development. As the screenshot above shows, I’ve been over-indexing on AI lately. It wouldn’t hurt to diversify a bit more into topics like behavioral science and design thinking.
If you want to try it out for yourself, the free plan allows you to create up to 10 boards per workspace. Paid plans allow you to apply different views, create advanced checklists, and invite collaborators.
Note: I'm not compensated for recommending this or any other tool featured in Tool Showcase.
The Power of Experimental Problem-Solving
“Do I have to solve this problem now, or will the world solve this problem for me later?” – Adam Savage
This quote comes from an episode of Adam Savage’s Tested, a YouTube channel created by the co-host of Mythbusters. I appreciate Savage’s pithy insights into the creative process – how to build stuff, test stuff, and learn something new with each iteration, even if the outcome is considered a failure by all conventional metrics.
In the context of this conversation, he’s describing how iterative problem-solving frees you from the tyranny of needing to be right all the time. Instead of feeling pressured to know the right approach to a challenge, let the world solve the problem for you: Do an experiment and see what happens.
We can apply this mindset to our work as talent development professionals. You may have expectations for how a user group will respond to your training program, but you can’t really know for sure until you run a pilot. If it doesn’t yield expected results, you can iterate and try again. The important part is getting real-world feedback and using it to move work forward.
Planning is critical to any training initiative. But there’s no replacement for putting your work out into the world and seeing what reaction you get.
If you’d like to catch the entire conversation, you can watch the YouTube video below.
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